WEBVTT More and more metro fire departments are investing in an important life-saving device that automates a basic life- support technique, CPR. Mark Tauscheck explains. C-P-R is a relatively simple process...but even the most fit medical professional will tell you it is exhausting to perform for even two minutes...so a machine that doesn't tire and delivers perfect chest compressions every time was an invention waiting to happen. For a patient in cardiac arrest - CPR helps keep blood circulating through the body and most importantly to the brain... Guidelines say CPR chest compressions should be at least two inches deep at a rate of at least 100 per minute... Pushing down on a rib cage that far, that fast, is exhausting. Johnston- Grimes is the latest fire department to purchase a LUCAS chest compression system...in fact they bought two, one for each city... 21:30-"it compresses the same rate, the same depth every time." Medics can also defibrillate while the LUCAS is doing compressions, unlike a human who has to stop compressions, let the defibrillator analyze if it can shock, and not touch the patient until it does shock... waiting possibly up to 20 seconds with no compressions. 22:12-"with this device we can limit the time off the chest which increases our survivability for our patients." The LUCAS also keeps working while the patient is transferred onto a backboard, out of their home, into the ambulance...an d watch...manual CPR doesn't stop while the device is being attached, and only stops when the LUCAS is ready to be turned on...the interruption is only a few seconds ... 26:19-"unless they have some sort of chest injury or don't fit in the machine, or don't have something that prohibits us from using it - this device will get used every time." Johnston- Grimes Fire received a Prairie Meadows Community Betterment Grant that helped them purchase two of these 13 thousand dollar devices. Des Moines, West Des Moines, Urbandale, Ankeny, Pleasant Hill, Runnells, and Polk City also have LUCAS machines.